


Piano, Art and Crystal Meth

by purplecrayons



Series: Piano, Art and Crystal Meth Series [1]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Cancer, Drug Use, Homelessness, M/M, Minor Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-30
Updated: 2013-06-30
Packaged: 2017-12-16 17:14:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/864552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purplecrayons/pseuds/purplecrayons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The story of two young men, Harry a meth addict and Louis a cancer patient, who after a chance meeting will teach each other how to live and ultimately, how to die.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Piano, Art and Crystal Meth

**Author's Note:**

> So this a sad Larry story about 2,500 words.  
> I own the ideas but not the guys.  
> Tumblr: all5guysof1d.tumblr.com

Lights flashed by as shouts were thrown overhead.

“His pulse is dropping!”

“Get him an I.V.”

I’m vaguely aware of someone groaning in pain.  When I realize that person’s me, I start to panic.  I try to struggle and move my arms and legs but someone shouts,

“Hold him down!”

I feel a prick in my arm before my sight turns fuzzy and I’m pulled into blackness.

I bolt upright, gasping for breath.  I’m temporarily blinded by the sun and I wonder if I’m dead.  As my breathing slows down and my eyes adjust, I realize I’m in the park.  My ‘second home’ as my mother likes to say, my ‘first home’ being the piano at our house.  Children are playing, birds are chirping and the breeze has picked up.  It was just a nightmare.  The same one I get every time I close my eyes.  I wrap my jacket around myself and check my phone, it’s getting late.

“Are you okay?” someone asks.  His voice is rough and I wonder why until I look over.  He’s dressed in several layers of clothing, his hair is sticking up in all direction and it looks like he’s covered in ten layers of dirt.

“It’s alright to ask and to answer your unasked question, yes, I’m homeless.”

“I wasn’t going to ask that.” I say.  My cheeks burn in embarrassment.

“No, but you were thinking it.  It’s okay. I’ve seen you around here a lot, almost every day.”

“Yeah I like it here.”

“I like it here too.  That’s why I stay here most nights”

I opt not to answer because I have no idea what to say.  I start getting up and glance at the guy, “well, bye.”

“I’m Harry,” he says.

“Louis”

When I get home and open the front door, I’m greeted with a more-than-usually worried mother.

“I promise, I’m fine!”

“Are you sure?  You were gone a long time.  I thought something had happened to you, especially since we found out about your condition.”  She looks at me like I’m made of glass that might break at any moment.  I hate it.  I hate being thought of like something fragile that needs protecting.

“Mom!  Do you have to bring that up every five minutes?  I don’t need any more reminders!”

She’s going cry and I can’t take it.  I’m already guilty about saying what I did.  I retreat to the piano and play until I loose myself.  When I finish two hours have past and I’m hungry.  I go to the kitchen to find something to eat when it happens.  I’m pulling a bottle of water out of the fridge when I get a sharp pain in my head and drop the bottle.  I have to sit on the floor to keep from falling over and my head spins.  I manage to yell from my mom before my world turns black.

When I wake-up I’m in the hospital with I.V.s and monitors surrounding me.  A bolt of fear goes through me but at least I’m alive.  My mother comes over and hugs me before she calls the doctor in.  He says that it was just a symptom.  Overall, considering the circumstances, I’m perfectly okay.  So, after being given a medicine to help the pain and orders to rest for a while, I’m cleared to go home.

 _Two days later_ , I’m at the park for the first time since my trip to the hospital.  I’m sitting on one of the benches when Harry sits beside me.  We sit in silence and watch the kids play until he leans over and pokes the hospital band on my wrist.  He reminds me of a child. Or someone forced to grow up too fast.

“I haven’t seen you around for a few days.  Are you sick?” he says.

“Yeah, I was in the hospital for a day and they told me to take it easy.”

“Why?”

“I have a brain tumor.  The doctors say I have around six months left.”

I expect and ‘I’m sorry’ but what he says blindsides me.

“For someone who only has a few months to live you’re not living very well.”

“What?” I say.

“Well if I knew I only had a few months to live, I wouldn’t be spending my time in the park.  I would go out and do things, break the rules, do something fun.”

“I have fun here! And how do you know what you would do?”

“I know what I would do because I’m trapped.  I can’t leave this place.”

“Why not?”

“Reasons.”

“Is it because you’re homeless?” I say.

“It’s because of the _reason_ I’m homeless.  Homeless is just the result.”

This is the most personal information I’ve got out of Harry and it intrigues me.  I begin to ask another question when he cuts me off with a look before lighting a cigarette.

“You smoke?” he says.

“No, it would speed up the process and give me less time.”

“That’s what I’m hoping for myself,” Harry mutters.

I choose not to question it and go back to our original medium of conversation.

“Do you have any suggestions for ‘fun’ things to do?” I say.

“Meth,” I whip around to look at him and he smiles.  “I’m kidding,” he says.

 Harry thinks for a moment before saying, “I know exactly what to do.  Right now you’re just _existing_.  You need to learn how to _live_.”

 About two weeks later we’re in the city’s art museum looking at all of the paintings.  It has taken that long for Harry to convince me to come and then for me to convince my mom to let me come.  Since then, I liked to think that I had gotten to know Harry well.

“Look at this one Louis!”  Harry says.  He’s giddy, going from painting to painting, pointing out techniques or how it makes him feel.  We stay the whole morning and decide to eat lunch in the museum’s café.

“Do you ‘do’ any type of art?” I say.

“I used to sketch draw and paint pictures and then enter them in contests.”

“Did you win?”

“Sometimes.”

“Do you draw anything now?”

“No.  I had to sell everything including my art supplies a while back to be able to pay for-” he stops midsentence and stands up.  “We should go.”

“Why?”

“Lets just go.” He leads me out of the museum and begins to head back to the metro to take it back home.  Nothing seems out of the ordinary on our ride back until we go above ground.  There, two men are waiting for us and as soon as we walk out both come towards Harry.  Harry sees them and says a curt goodbye before walking off.  Walking home I wonder if I should have stayed with Harry.  It’s getting dark and I don’t want my mother to worry more than she has to so I keep heading for home.

It’s a few days before I see Harry again.  When I do see him again he’s argumentative and won’t answer any of my questions about where he’s been at or who those men were.   Instead he is content to listen to me talk about my day and the piano piece I’d finished composing that morning.  He mentions that he wants to hear me play one day and I agree.  I have to leave soon after that.  I tell him it’s for a doctor’s appointments but it’s actually the only time my mom will drive me to the store.  It’s too far away to walk and with my unpredictable head I don’t have a driver’s license.  I buy a large sketch book and some pencils and paints and put them in a large canvas bag.

I take his gift to the park every day after that but he doesn’t show up for another few days.  He makes up for it though even when he runs up to our meeting place later than he usually arrives.

“I found the best place.”

“What are you talking about?” I say.

He takes me to a building labeled as a dance studio.

“It’s closed Harry.”

“So?”

“Well we can’t just walk in!  It’s probably locked.  It looks like it’s been closed for ages anyways.”

Ignoring me, he opens the door and steps in.  I look around, scared someone is going to see us and call the police but I see no one.

Inside is an office that has a hallway leading off it.  The first room is small with several music stands and a piano.  Harry gestures for me to sit down and I do.  I play some of my original pieces and then some popular songs.  Harry even makes an attempt at singing the lyrics to some of them.

“Would you ever release your own cd?” Harry asks.

“I would love to do that.” I say.  “But it takes a lot of money, effort and time, which is something I don’t have.”

He looks at me like he’s confused and I shift the bag on my shoulder, uncomfortable under the look.

“What’s in the bag?” he says.

“Oh I almost forgot.  Here, I bought this for you.”

When he opens the bag so many emotions cross his face in such a short amount of time it makes it impossible to figure out what he thinks of the gift.

“Play more piano.”  Harry says.  Its sounds like a question.

“Okay?” I say.  That’s not the reaction I expected but then again whenever you think you’ve got Harry figured out something comes out of right field and hits you.

I sit down and begin to play again.  I finish the first song and I realize why Harry wanted me to play.  He was sketching me at the piano.  After a few more songs Harry finally stands up and hands me the sketchbook.

“It’s beautiful,” I say. 

I continue to look at the sketch until my phone beeps.  It’s my mom wondering where I’m at.  I hurry to gather my things and almost run out the door with Harry behind me.  It’s dark outside except for several street lamps.  I’m trying to figure out which direction my house is when I realize that there’s a car in the parking lot.  It’s the same guys from the metro.  Harry tells me goodbye just like he did before.  This time I get across the parking lot and then turn back.  What I see next surprises me.  One of the men punches Harry in the stomach and next in the face.  The other looks on and barks questions.

“Where’s my money?  You said you’d have it by now!  Why don’t you have it?  I can’t give you any more until you pay.  You’re going to have to find someone else to deal you meth.  That’s if we don’t kill you first.”

I call 911 but the men leave right after that.  I run over and crouch next to Harry.  He’s bleeding from a gash on his forehead and his nose.  I do my best to stay calm and not cry but the sight of the blood and the adrenaline rushing through me makes me shake with fear.  It’s for Harry and me.  Life is fragile and could be taken away so easily.  One wrong punch and Harry could be dead right now.  One wrong dose of _meth_ and he could be dead. I stayed until an ambulance takes him away.  They offer for me to ride with them to the hospital but I say I’m not going.  I don’t need to go to the hospital again, even if it is for someone else.  Besides, at the moment I don’t think I could face Harry.

For the next three weeks I stay inside my house, not going to the park, only playing the piano.  I’m furious at Harry and at the world and at myself for being so blind.  Harry said he was trapped which is now clear to me because he has debts to pay to his meth dealer.  He couldn’t leave without paying them. Harry said he had to sell all of his things because he needed money.  And the worst thing of all is that Harry actually joked about meth being something fun to do.  In none of that did he mention that he was on meth.  Then again I was stupid for not realizing there had to be a reason he was living on the streets by himself.

Finally, tired of my moping, my mother urges me out and to the park.  She has no idea about Harry.  If she did know, she would lock me in the house and never permit me to visit the park again.

I’m sitting in the grass when Harry sits beside me.  We sit in silence for what seems like ages.  When I finally look over, his face is littered with bruises but they’re fading and yellow.

“You feeling any better?” I say.

“Yeah,” he pauses, “ It’s been three weeks since you’ve been here.”

“I know,” I say.  I don’t want to discuss it but Harry gives a ‘go on’ motion with is hand.  “I’ve been angry at you.”

“Because I was beat up?”

“Because you do meth.  I’m angry that you have a perfectly good shot at life and you destroy it with a drug.  I _wish_ I had a shot at life like you but I don’t.  You sit there and waste what I want so badly for a temporary bliss.  I hate it.  I hate you for doing it,” I say.  Harry’s face is blank and he’s pulling at the grass.  He doesn’t say anything so I get up to leave.

“Would you stop hating me if I quit?”

“Maybe.”  I leave then and I stay away.  I do my best not to think about Harry for the next week as I record the songs that I’ve composed.  As much as I’m mad at Harry his encouragement has led me to record my pieces, albeit at an amateur level. It’s at the end of the week when I get a constant headache that won’t go away.  Two days later I’m rushed into the hospital.  At first I’m fully conscious but as the days go past I float in and out more.  The doctors have moved my time to live to about two weeks.  That’s when I tell my mom about Harry.  I cry and she cries too.  She agrees to take a cd of my recorded piano compositions to our meeting place at the park.  She takes it when I’m asleep and is back before I wake up.  When I do, she tells me she took it and waited for him but he didn’t show.  She left it on the bench with a note saying my hospital room number and how long I had to live.

I could feel it.  I could feel it, in the back of my mind.  It’s a feeling telling me it’s almost time for me to die.  I gave my mom another note to leave for Harry.  This time it says ‘ _I forgive you. Remember to Live._ ’  Only a few minutes after that, my world dims and then extinguishes completely.  As far as I know, Harry never did come see me.  If only I knew that when my mom went to leave my last note, she found the cd lying on the bench.  The only difference is that in the cover, is a track list and a hand drawn picture of me doing the thing I loved, playing the piano.

 

-

 

_I’ll always remember.  Not only to live but also the boy that I met in the park.  I will cry for him and the time we both lost just **existing**. In the end I thank him. He did not die in vain.  He gave me purpose.  As I step outside today, six months sober, I will finally breathe in a lungful of clear guilt-free air.  For the first time in years, I will **live**._

[Tumblr](all5guysof1d.tumblr.com)


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